Welcome to Homecoming week at Highlands High School!

The alumni will be flowing in to watch this regular season finale with 5A power Scott County traveling up I-75 to meet up with one of the Top teams in 4A.

Game time: 7:30pm

Scott County (7-2) has had a pretty good season with their blemishes by 6A Madison Central in the middle of season and just lost a heartbreaker last night against the Top 5A team Woodford County.  Looking at all the statistical season info they might as well be called the Young Guns.  I don’t see any Senior in any category!  The starting QB is a Sophomore (Charlie Ellison), his main role this year has been to hand the ball off and allow your RBs to run!!! The current split has been 915 yds passing vs 2700 yds rushing for the season. I’m assuming they still run that crazy offense that we saw when they played us in 2022 with the double back set with backs going in different directions to really mess with the camera man.  Let’s see how that fairs this time around. Camera crew better be on their toes.

Highlands (7-2) will be coming in with the same record with only blemishes at Boyle and at Elder this season.  They rebounded nicely after the Elder loss by putting a running clock on Mason County.  The key to this game is to stop the run of course.  

Scott County does come in with a nice 5 game win streak against the Birds, albeit 4 of those were during the Weinrich tenure and the 2022 playoff game loss the only Sphire era loss, while they were 5A foe’s.

Should be a perfect fall weather night for a Friday Nights game in the mid 50s and dry!

Who you got?

I’m having Highlands staying perfect at home with a bit of a grind out win for the Birds:  

24-14

GO BIRDS!!!

Scott County does indeed run the same offense. They’ve been running it since ‘97! 
 

Scott County has dominated Highlands in the last decade or so. I think it’ll be a hard fought game but it’s hard to pick against my Cards. Timmy Emongo will be Timmy Emongo and they’ll block a punt!

28-21 Cards.

Highlands 31

Scott County 14 

HIghlands by 14.  

Birds win there Homecoming by 10. Lorenzen will be hard to stop or even slow down. 

I’ll be able to swing up to catch this one in person. Anytime I can watch Scott COs offense in action I try to make the game. 

I’ll take the Birds by 3 scores if they stay the course and run the ball. They had success early on at Elder but went away from it for whatever reason. If they throw more they should still be fine as they have some fast receivers. 

I guess the question would be the Birds defense, but they’ve been solid all year and held their own for a while against Elder.

If the Cardinals lose their cool as was stated in the Woodford game thread, it’ll be a quiet ride back to Georgetown, and with the playoffs around the corner you don’t want to risk a player getting tossed out.  Good luck to both teams and keep your eye on the ball.

12 minutes ago, Breds82 said:

If the Cardinals lose their cool as was stated in the Woodford game thread, it’ll be a quiet ride back to Georgetown

If we start to lose and any sort of bad officiating makes things worse we’ll 100% lose our cool. Every loss I can remember there have been unsportsmanlike penalties late besides Mad Central this season. There have been some pretty bizarre ones(Crossing ‘24, Cooper ‘23) for example. 

1 minute ago, Scottcountyred said:

If we start to lose and any sort of bad officiating makes things worse we’ll 100% lose our cool. Every loss I can remember there have been unsportsmanlike penalties late besides Mad Central this season. There have been some pretty bizarre ones(Crossing ‘24, Cooper ‘23) for example. 

Seems like controversy follows Scott County...

2 minutes ago, theguru said:

Seems like controversy follows Scott County...

Many officials have dealt with a County meltdown before. I’m sure our leash is short before the antics even begin.

Hopefully we avoid that Friday and put Highlands to bed like usual.

Just now, Scottcountyred said:

Many officials have dealt with a County meltdown before. I’m sure our leash is short before the antics even begin.

Hopefully we avoid that Friday and put Highlands to bed like usual.

If not you will get penalized all the way back to Georgetown. 

In my very biased opinion the NKOA has the best officials in the state. They won’t put up with any shenanigans. If it’s an issue then why doesn’t Coach McKee just put an end to it? I want a clean and well played game.

1 hour ago, Scottcountyred said:

If we start to lose and any sort of bad officiating makes things worse we’ll 100% lose our cool. Every loss I can remember there have been unsportsmanlike penalties late besides Mad Central this season. There have been some pretty bizarre ones(Crossing ‘24, Cooper ‘23) for example. 

Have remotely followed the Cardinals under McKee’s for years and certainly not in person as you have.  Very disappointing to hear they lose their cool as you say.  Got to give Coach McKee his offensive props.  They bambuzle big defensive lines with quick, athletic 200 lb lineman and adept ball handling and misdirection.  No props for their defense.  Just porous against Woodford rushing and passing game.

33 minutes ago, Breds82 said:

In my very biased opinion the NKOA has the best officials in the state. They won’t put up with any shenanigans. If it’s an issue then why doesn’t Coach McKee just put an end to it? I want a clean and well played game.

Our players rarely don’t play clean. It’s almost always verbal or gestures that get flagged. Now, if you punch a player, put hands on an official then throw your helmet 30 yards down the field while yelling a whole list of profanity at the officials then you’ll be kicked off the team as we saw last season. 

McKee has made a few changes to try and combat the crazy behavior we’ve seen a few times, but he himself accounts for a number of our unsportsmanlike calls. It seemingly is just a part of the Scott County season to an extent. 
 

This will not be a low scoring game.  If Highlands offense uses Lorenzon  and Williams to pound, pound, pound the pass will be wide open.  That was the Woodford Co. recipe that produced 57 points.  Candidly I was shocked that SC was so porous.  On the flip side the Cardinals Wing-T offense was deceptive and their backs hit holes as small cracks opened.  Probably a nightmare to defend if your D-line hits, absorbs and then looks….too, late, he’s gone.  Defense better know the Cardinals’ tendencies and be right consistently.  McKee’s has only done the same thing for 29 years.

Scott Co 21

Highlands 26